Website from concept to working site?

[gdforumbob]

I'm trying to brush up and get back into designing websites after a 5 year stint, which makes me ancient in the web world.

I'm learning CSS and want to set up tableless designs, but I'm having a hard time "trying not to" cookie cutter it.

I've been to the csszengarden.com site and checked out designs I liked. Some I find have a giant GIF background image that's 150K or so. Others are tricked out using background color and nifty hacks.

Anyhow, I need to get back to basics. How do you guys "comp out" or "sketch" a design that you will use with CSS?

Back in the old days, one would design it in Photoshop and grid it out as slices for table cells. How does one do it these days ala-Web 2.0?

Do you still comp it up in Photoshop and slice, but now use each image as a "background" in the CSS?

I'm having trouble connecting text based navigation vs the old slice and dice-using-javascript-rollovers method.

Can someone suggest a good workflow, because I've been sitting on a website trying to figure out how to go about it? If I give up, I'd probably just go the tables route, but I'd rather not.

I have ADD + graphic-design block, so if anyone can suggest or offer tips, let me know especially regarding "workflow".

Thanks!
Bob

[tZ]

Find an idea which to sell yourself by then work up something which reinforces that concept on the web and in a logo/mark.

This way you are selling yourself through all forms of collateral and your website is not just a mere place which holds your work but, a frame which coincides and reinforces your identity to further sell yourself.

Generally though I think/find paper is the best solution to start off with.

After you have the general idea/composition depending on how "complex" it is one can use a variety of methods such as slicing. However, I myself prefer CSS.

Here is a very good articles on CSS for the beginner. This is the way I learned… took me afew days or so to grasp the basics.

http://www.wpdfd.com/editorial/basics/

good luck

[1ooScreamingTrees]

How do you design your websites these days

The approach that I take can involve all of the above - but I always start with paper. Formulating concepts on paper forces one into the design mindset, with the computer-crutch out of the equation. As much as I hear this as a student designer, it still took a very long time for the lightbulb to 'go off,' and the bulb was turned on by an unexpected source, Picasso:

"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers"

From there, it is a matter of the situation. Since it sounds like you have a working-practice of table layout design, I'd say your desire to learn CSS is a great 'picking-back-up' point.

Since the level of involvement when learning CSS is going to be greater for you than the other options you mentioned, I think you're on the right track. In my opinion, the key is versatility within standard practices. The benefits outweigh the combined learning curve for all of these approaches.

Were you introduced to XHTML before you took a break from web design? The standards have become much more well-formed than previous versions of HTML, and I would advice picking up those details before delving into CSS.